


A Hallmark Moment

by Traveler



Category: Captain America (Movies), Step Up (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Unusuals
Genre: F/M, Not Beta Read, Not Canon Compliant, Steve Sketching, holiday fluff, making memories
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-26
Updated: 2015-12-26
Packaged: 2018-05-09 12:41:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5540411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Traveler/pseuds/Traveler
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Someone had decided they needed to get out for the evening; so they’d all gone out on the town. Not as Captain America, Black Widow, Hawkeye, and the Winter Soldier-but as normal people; or as normal as they’d get, anyway . . ."</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Hallmark Moment

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to have been posted before yesterday, and real life happened :(. 
> 
> So a belated Merry Christmas to all, and a Happy New Year!
> 
> Note: While google and IMDB spell Eddie's name Eddy; I've watched and read several articles that spell his name Eddie. I've chosen to spell his name that way here.

Setting his drawing pad on top of the lap desk, he settled back to look at the picture with a critical eye.  Calling up the memory he was trying to capture to insure he’d not missed a details while committing it to paper . . .

**2 days before** (1 day before the 3 S.H.I.E.L.D assassins had been called-up for a mission) . . .

Someone had decided they needed to get out for the evening; so they’d all gone out on the town. Not as Captain America, Black Widow, Hawkeye, and the Winter Soldier-but as normal people; or as normal as they’d get, anyway.  Along the way they’d stopped by the “Stage Restaurant” and picked up Jason Walsh and his partner turned girlfriend, Casey Shraeger and then headed towards a pub meeting up with Eddie at some point along the way.  There’d been a lot of laughter, singing, dancing, bit of piano playing, and a very memorable rendition of “Santa Baby” performed by their very own Natasha; that had turned his ears pink and face red. After that, someone had suggested ice skating at Rockefeller Center. When they’d found out that Steve and Bucky had never been, that had been the deciding factor; it had to be done.

Off they’d gone; he’d fallen so many times, he’d not been able to stop laughing at himself and Bucky with their flailing arms and jerky attempts to move forward without falling.  They could jump off buildings, fling shields, fight with something akin to grace – but ice skating had been beyond them. 

Clint and Natasha trying to help by skating backwards and pulling them along had only ended up with Natasha gracefully, and Clint not so gracefully sprawled on the ice with them.  Just in time to watch Jason, Casey, and Eddie skate by doing a perfectly synchronized routine. 

Finally they’d climbed off the ice, turned in their skates, and purchasing mugs of coco and cider as fresh snow had begun to fall. They were making their way back towards the Stage, still laughing at their own antics . . .

But, it was a moment from the walk home that he’d chosen to capture on the page before him.  As the artist, he’d take the view as though he was standing behind the group of them, looking onto the scene. 

The soft edge, gifted to almost every holiday setting, the glow of the street lights haloed in the chilled air, their soft light reflecting off the falling snow.  Eddie, in his black leather newsboy cap was a bit down the block, not far but dancing merrily to a tune in his head.  Clint, just ahead scraping the fresh snow from the window seal of a softly lit restaurant, thick fingers working to pack it into a snowball (that would eventually be lobbed at Eddie); his mischievous smirk firmly in place. 

In the foreground, he was to the right; his own arm incased in his leather bomber jacket just visible on the page, wrapped around Natasha’s waist.  Her head covered with a green beret, red hair peeking out from between it and the collar of her navy wool coat.  Bucky stood to Tasha’s left, his shoulders scrunched, using the flipped up collar of his black leather jacket to shield his ears from the cold, while his unseen hands had been shoved into the pockets of the black 501s he favored. Then finishing off the left corner was Jason, his arm slung around Casey’s shoulder even as her face was profiled where she’d been talking animatedly with Natasha, about something. The soft flakes of fresh snow wafting to the ground around them, dusting their outerwear here and there.

At some point shortly after that moment, Clint had lobbed the snowball and hit Eddie in the back with it, they’d walked by a bar-maybe a dance club, but the patron’s had been spilling out onto the street, the song filtered out from within had Clint and Eddie singing along, the latter breaking into a bit of choreographed dance routine.  All the guys paused as Clint and Eddie got to one line in the song, having Jason, and Bucky joining them calling out the words “. . . I’m on a roll . . . my ex wants sex tonight. . .” punctuated by all 4 of them with a provocative hip thrust.   

Tasha had thrown her head back and laughed making a comment about Clint’s ex in Russian that had the archer sticking his tongue out at her. While Casey’d rolled her eyes and elbowed Jason muttering something about teaming up with Beaumont to hurt him, while Bucky and he had both smiled at each other. 

Steve couldn’t help but smile at the memory; it was probably one of the most normal he’d had sense he’d woken from the ice.  His S.H.I.E.L.D mandated councilor had suggested he journal, but writing had never done much for him. Drawing though; that allowed him to capture the things he held dear, things he didn’t want to forget-the good, the bad, and the ugly, so that he could look back, reflect on this life he’d been given.

The softening of the music in the common area, and gentle vibration of the room announced the arrival of the Quin Jet to the tower.  Looking up at the clock, he smiled when he realized it was nine o’clock, Christmas Eve.  They’d made it home in time for Christmas.

His smile broadening, he sat the lap desk and drawing aside, and stood to make sandwiches and collect drinks.  It would be a familiar scene, when they walked in freshly showered in search of food while coming down off the mission induced high.  Tomorrow, they’d celebrate the holiday with friends; opening gifts, toasting friendships new and old, all while making new memories to be cherished for years to come.

A line from a book that Bucky’s mom had read to them when they were younger came to mind, “Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night.”

**Author's Note:**

> This work is the product of a conversation a friend of mine and I had after we watched this [Misha Gabriel I'm on a Roll](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzvGSiOu_ik)


End file.
